Rev. Austin Miles, a chaplain in Northern California is a writer and historian. He is the author of Santa's Surprising Origins, a
story that received worldwide circulation and resulted in him being cast in the 2004 Hallmark Christmas Movie titled, Single Santa Seeks Mrs. Claus. He
played the mall Santa who magically received the gift of sign language.

Sunday, October 12, 2014

Debates have arisen about present day Israel. Times have drastically changed. Are the Jews of today still God’s chosen people? Is their land still sacred? GUEST COLUMNIST PASTOR ROGER ANGHIS answers these questions by showing what the Bible actually says about this issue. It is with the author’s permission that this column is published in full.

There are many people today who will say that the Israel that is today is not the Israel of the Bible and that we have no obligation to support them. If that is the case then all the prophecies about Israel in the last days is a lie. God said that because Israel refused to live within the concepts and principles laid out for them through Moses, that he would scatter them to all nations. He did. He also stated that in the last days He would bring them back to their homeland. That began in May of 1948. This is all verified in Jeremiah 31:10:

“Hear the word of the LORD, O ye nations, and declare it in the isles afar off, and say, He that scattered Israel will gather him, and keep him, as a shepherd doth his flock.

(Vs.11) For the LORD hath redeemed Jacob, and ransomed him from the hand of him that was stronger than he.” Notice that this comment is directed at ‘nations’ not Israel. God is simply telling all nations that He will gather them back to the land that He gave them. Also notice that He says that He will ‘keep them’. That is the Hebrew word shamar and means to preserve and protect.

[1] God not only declared that He would gather them together again but He would protect them as well. Remember there have been several wars against Israel since 1948 by the Arab nations with 500 times their land mass and many times their population and army size, yet Israel has won them all. Intelligence says opposing Israel is not a good idea.

For those of you that still don’t believe that the Israel of today is the Israel of scripture here is a little more evidence that proves that God is not a liar as you are so inclined to believe: Jeremiah 30:3: “For, lo, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will bring again the captivity of my people Israel and Judah, saith the LORD: and I will cause them to return to the land that I gave to their fathers, and they shall possess it.” The Palestinians may say it is their land but God says it belongs to Israel. This makes it very clear that Israel is where God has intended for her to be and that this Israel is the Israel of scripture.

Will God really judge nations according to how they treat Israel? Let’s look at Matthew 25:31 “When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory:

(32) And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats:

(33) And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.

(34) Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:

(35) For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in:

(36) Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.

(37) Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink?

(38) When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee?

(39) Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?

Mat 25:40) And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of
these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.”

This is not talking about the church nor is it talking about the Jews but people who have made it into the millennium. In verse 40 Jesus is saying to these people that because they had blessed His brethren, the Jews, they had blessed Him and for that they were counted with the sheep that would inherit the kingdom of God.

Now, to the nations that did not bless Israel we see a different eternity. Mat 25:41 “Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.” The reason for this is because they did not do what was referred to in verses 35 through 39. Then Jesus says in Matthew 25:45; “Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me. (46) And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.”

Some will try to claim that there is no correlation between this and the actual Israel but Jesus is a member of the tribe of Judah and that makes Him an Israelite so when He talks about different nations either blessing His brethren or cursing His brethren, it can only be Israel. There is another end times verse that we should look at and that is Joel 3:1 “For, behold, in those days, and in that time, when I shall bring again the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem,

(2) I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them there for my people and for my heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land.” Bring the captivity is a reference to the end time gathering of the nation of Israel back to the land that was given to them by God. Again we see in verse two that Israel is referred to as His heritage or His brethren. Also in verse two is says that He will gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat. This word, Jehoshaphat, means the valley of Jehovah’s judgment. The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon states that this is the place of ultimate judgment!

Why are they being judged? Because they “they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land.” Pay attention to that. Has the borders of Israel been moved? Does Israel occupy all the land that God gave them when they left Egypt? Have the borders been moved in modern times?

We can go all the way back to when the children of Israel were slaves in Egypt. What did God do to Egypt for the way they treated Israel? He turned from the world’s most powerful nation into a third world nation almost overnight and they have never recovered from that. In 1991 after the fall of the USSR and the Russian Jews began returning to Israel in large numbers. Because of this Israel needed funds to house and educate these people.

They had gone to the World Bank for a loan and was granted the loan as long as the United States was the guarantor. President George H.W. Bush sent his Chief of Staff James Baker to negotiate the loan.

One of the stipulations for the US to guarantee the loan was to stop building settlements on the West Bank. This was a land for peace deal of which NONE have been successful in attaining peace. The West Bank is where the mountains of Israel are spoken of in scripture concerning the end times and how those mountains will be part of the prosperity of Israel.
Footnotes:

Pastor Roger Anghis is the Founder of RestoreFreeSpeech.org, an organization designed to draw attention to the need of returning free speech rights to churches that was restricted in 1954. President of The Damascus Project, TheDamascusProject.org, which has a stated purpose of teaching pastors and lay people the need of the churches involvement in the political arena and to teach the historical role of Christianity in the politics of the United States. Married-37 years, 3 children, three grandchildren.

Web site: BuildingTheTruth.org
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